Community Structure and Innovation: The Case of Urban Renewal

The presence of, and speed of application for, and number of dollars reserved for, Federal urban renewal programs (the measures of innovation) are analyzed for 582 American cities over 25,000 population in 1960. Other variables studied are ethnicity, income, Democratic vote, political structure, industrial character, educational level, voting turnout, age and size of the city, unemployment, migration, housing condition, and nonwhite composition. Findings: older and larger cities and those with low levels of education and income, high unemployment, fewer managers and officials, and low levels of in-migration and growth are more innovative, even when region, the condition of housing, and the size of city are controlled. Five different theories are discussed: political culture, centralization of formal political structure, concentration or diffusion of community power, community differentiation, and continuity, community integration. An alternative theory is offered that interorganizational networks (interfaces) between centers of power increase capacity for coordination. Such networks are furthered by greater structural differentiation and an accumulation of experience and information in the community system. The data available provide only indirect tests of the theory.